We Stich These Wounds
by LadyTaiyo
Summary: A moment Rodolphus was not meant to see that makes him reflect on what he has dealt with in his Marriage to Bellatrix. Based on the Black Veil Brides song of the same name. One-Shot. Bellatrix X Voldemort.


_**I know this isn't the Weapon update everyone was expecting, but I did want to get something out this week. This is intended as a companion to Weapon but it can be read as a stand alone piece as well. It is based upon the Black Veil Brides Song of the same name.**_

**_As always, review, any and all feedback is appreciated and I value every response I receive._**

**_Enjoy._**

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><p>It had to be the strangest picture he had ever seen.<p>

By all rights he shouldn't have seen it at all, if one of them had happened to look up at the wrong moment he would have been dead in an instant.

But they didn't and so he had stood and stared through a crack in the door, only two inches wide at most, with a perverse sort of fascination.

They weren't doing anything per say, but it would have been far less painful to walk in on them having sex than whatever he was watching now. No, there was nothing remotely lewd about it, it was so much worse, it was intimate.

Even in the hazy early morning sun that filtered in through the window he could easily discern _His_ frame, tall and slender, resting with _His_ back supported by the head board of _His_ bed. And her between _His_ legs, equally lithe, her back to _His_ thin chest, and she looked terribly fragile with _His_ massive hands on her shoulders. The long, graceful fingers absently manipulated a shiny dark curl with an easy familiarity that told him this was not an uncommon occurrence.

The fabric that draped her shoulders was unfamiliar, jet black, vapor woven into something more solid, but still not even as heavy as silk. The neckline was much too low for someone her size and so the valley between breasts lay exposed, an endless expanse of soft looking flesh before giving way to the very top of her flat stomach where the robes finally closed, concealing the rest of her terrible beauty from the world.

She was upset about something, he couldn't be sure what, but he could see those fathomless eyes glittering with unshed tears. His wife was not one given to emotional displays, and even so clearly stricken she gave no other indication of her pain.

But _He_ knew, _He_ knew her better than anyone, because _He_ was the only one she had ever let in. Like her, _He_ kept his emotion contained carefully, far below the surface where they couldn't be read. But now a rare moment had come in which _His_ eyes betrayed _Him_, the faint, almost iridescent blue, flashing crimson where the gold light of dawn struck them. A sort of intensity that had nothing to do with conquest or destruction, he thought he caught something almost like concern, but perhaps the rising sun lied, _He_ blinked and uncharacteristic softness vanished once more.

She was his wife damn it, he shouldn't have felt like an intruder into _Their_ private world, there shouldn't even have been a _Them_, _He_ had seen to that _Himself_ long ago.

But _He_ had a way of ending up with exactly what _He_ wanted, and no matter how vehemently _He_ might try to deny it _He_ wanted just as much himself. The only difference between them was a gift from the gods in the form of exceptional luck, chance, nothing more. But _He_ had the luxury of using dishonesty to make her chase _Him_ and because of it she loved _Him_ dearly. There was no point in being delusional over the matter, nor did he even possess the option, she had made it abundantly clear when she was wed to him, twenty years old and reeling from the supposed loss of her first paramour.

Why _He_ had suddenly severed ties with her and given her away all those years ago was something he still struggled to understand. He could guess at it of course, and the answer he had arrived at was as laughably simple as it was tragic.

_He_ had been happy.

To those unfamiliar with _Him_ this solution sounded absurd, but he had observed long enough to know _He_ never went near anything like contentment. In all likelihood _He_ had pushed her away in some bizarre bid to distance _Himself_ from mere mortals.

But there was no force quite like her either and it seemed even _Their Lord_ could not resist for long, so maybe it was her who was to blame over _His_ outrageously good fortune.

So she belonged to _Him_, the truth was she may as well have married _Him_ anyway, for all the loyalty she showed her actual husband. She took him for granted, in the worst way. He had tried, truly, to be understanding of the fact that she had been in love long before he came along. It exceeded tolerance, her relationship with _Him_ crossed so many boundaries, deprived him of many rights any spouse could rightfully demand.

She was rarely actively malicious, what she did hurt so much more, she simply paid him no mind. He was not hated, not despised, he was not worth her emotion, always secondary to her great love.

He needed to let go, he was never going to escape _His_ shadow in her mind, and every moment he was reminded of it. In their bed she slept with her cheek pressed to the garish tattoo on her inner arm, in Azkaban she had cried for _Him_ endlessly from somewhere within herself so dark even the dementors could not touch her.

And seeing them reunited after fourteen years felt as it did seeing them now, only then_ He_ had dropped his uncaring facade long enough to turn His cruel eyes upon him and smirk as she knelt at _His_ feet, as if to say, "Do you see now, that you can never have what is mine?". As if he could have ever hoped to surmount _Their_ long history.

And he never would and he knew it, and they looked so terribly correct like that, he couldn't even summon enough spite to want to deny her it all.

Which was why he did not barge in that morning and instead backed away and left _Them_ to _Their_ moment.

After all he had never bothered to ask for the respect he deserved, what was the point in starting now?

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><p><em><strong>So how was my first attempt at characterizing Rodolphus?<strong>_


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